Mies-en-scène

Students and faculty of the School of Social Service Administration (now the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice) gather in their new home base, designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and dedicated in 1965. (UChicago Photographic Archive, apf2-07544, Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library)

Cover to cover

Students illustrated the covers of The University of Chicago Weekly, a student publication from 1892 to 1907. Clockwise, from top left, are covers illustrated by David Allan Robertson, AB 1902; Milton G. G. Sills, AB 1903; Edson B. Cooke, EX 1903; and Ben Cohen, EX 1905. Each issue of The University of Chicago Weekly included a mix of sports results; student essays and stories; cartoons; campus news; and ads for bicycles, suits, medical schools, and fountain pens. (University of Chicago Library)

Close-knit

A couple talks domestic affairs in their married student apartment housing. In 1955 this magazine reported that there were about 1,000 married students enrolled at the University, most in graduate degree programs. The University provided only 409 apartments for married students at the time, 340 of which were in prefab homes that had been erected along the Midway at the end of World War II. Making plans to demolish these prefabs in the mid-1950s, the University decided to acquire and convert more existing apartment buildings for affordable married students’ housing. At the same time, the University started planning new housing for undergraduate students, renovations to College facilities, a new building for the Law School, and other improvements. (Photography by William M. Rittase, UChicago Photographic Archive, apf4-02889, Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library)

Daniel J. Boorstin

Daniel J. Boorstin, the Preston and Sterling Morton Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of History, pictured here around 1961, joined the UChicago faculty in 1944 and helped establish an interdisciplinary social sciences program in the Hutchins College. A specialist in American social history, Boorstin was best known for his three-volume work The Americans (1958–73), the third volume of which won the 1974 Pulitzer Prize for History. He worked closely with his wife, Ruth Frankel Boorstin, AM’64, who edited his academic work. Professor Boorstin left the University in 1969 to direct what is today the National Museum of American History, and in 1975 he was appointed as the 12th Librarian of Congress, a position he held until 1987. Under his watch, public use of the library more than doubled. Another UChicago alum, Carla D. Hayden, AM’77, PhD’87, has held the same position since 2016. Did you study with Boorstin? Share your memories at uchicago-magazine@uchicago.edu. (UChicago Photographic Archive, apf1-00808, Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library)

Dedication to the arts

Art lovers fill the Smart Museum of Art at its 1974 dedication event. Part of the Cochrane-Woods Art Center, the museum opened across a courtyard from the new home of the Department of Art History. The $2.75 million complex was designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes. On display at the dedication were pieces from the University’s permanent collection, as well as new donations including 19th- and 20th-century sculptures, Chinese and Japanese paintings, and contemporary American art. The Smart Museum celebrates its 50th anniversary during the 2024–25 academic year. (See “Smart at 50.”) (Photography by Joel Snyder, SB’61)

Net gains

Vesna Martich Kriss, AB’84, MD’88, at left, and teammate Celeste (Travis) Fulgham, AB’85 (Class of 1984), compete in a varsity volleyball match in the early 1980s. Women’s volleyball was long offered as an intramural sport, and it was one of the earliest women’s sports on campus to compete in intercollegiate play. The varsity team was officially formed in the late 1960s under Mary Jean Mulvaney, chair of the women’s division of the Department of Physical Education (later chair of both men’s and women’s athletics), and Patricia Kirby, associate chair of Physical Education and Athletics and coach of the women’s badminton, basketball, softball, and volleyball teams. Longtime athletic administrator Rosalie “Rosy” Resch, AB’73, who retired in 2022, coached the team from 1977 to 1997. Did you play volleyball at UChicago? Serve us some memories at uchicago-magazine@uchicago.edu. (Photography by Jeff Terrell, AB’84; Copyright 2025, The Chicago Maroon. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.)

The show must go on

A resourceful student makes a valiant effort to get to class on time after a heavy snowfall. What was your preferred mode of transport on campus? Tell us at uchicago-magazine@uchicago.edu. (Copyright 2025, The Chicago Maroon. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.)

Book talk

Hyde Parkers chat in the Seminary Co-op Bookstore’s former location in 2000. What books were you reading at the turn of the century? Share your Y2K reading list at uchicago-magazine@uchicago.edu. (Photography by Wes Pope. Hyde Park/Kenwood, image 128, 38198100122256_26. Comer Archive of Chicago in the Year 2000 [University of Illinois Chicago])

Have photos from your UChicago days? The Magazine may be able to share them in Alumni News and in a future Snapshots. Send high-resolution scans and your memories of what the pictures are about to uchicago-magazine@uchicago.edu.